rhetoric in civic life (rcl) terms

rhetoric

the use of symbols (words & images) to share ideas, enabling people to work together to make decisions about matters of common concern, create identity, and construct social reality

rhetor

any person, group, or institution that uses rhetoric

rhetorician

a person who studies rhetoric

symbol

an arbitrary representation of something else

a word, an image, or an artifact that represents a thing, thought, or action

verbal symbols

symbols found in language (whether spoken or written)

visual symbols

symbols such as pictures, images, objects, artifacts, and embodied actions

symbolic action

expressive human action, the rhetorical mobilization of symbols to act in and affect the world

identification

a communicative process through which people are unified into a whole on the basis of common interests or characteristics

constitutive rhetoric

the art of constituting character, community, and culture in language

(constituting = forming/creating)

social reality

reality as understood through the symbols humans use to represent it

civic engagement

people’s participation in individual or collective action to construct identity and develop solutions to social, economic, and political challenges in their communities, states, nations, and world

stranger relationality

a willingness to communicate with others to develop collective self-understanding that acknowledges mutual interdependence with strangers and in ways that focus on the public good instead of simply seeing one’s self as seeking to maximize individual power through purchasing and economic decisions

rhetorical agency

the capacity to act, that is, to have the competence to speak or write [or engage in any form of symbolic action] in a way that will be recognized or heeded by others in one’s community

posthumanist theory of agency

a theory that “rejects the human agent as the primary source of change but redeems that agent as a participant in the larger network of which [they are] a part

political friendship

a set of habits people use in civic spaces to interact and make decisions with people who might be strangers or who have different identities, interests, or needs

argument

to refer to a rhetorical form that provides data for a claim

argumentation

the process of exchanging arguments

• Interactive (a process), cooperative, & contingent (occurs under conditions of uncertainty)

syllogism

a statement in which a conclusion is inferred from the truth of two premises

• Major premise — speaks to universal truth

• Minor premise — speaks to a specific example of the universal

• Conclusion — the result of combining the two premises

enthymeme

a syllogism based on probabilities, signs, and examples, whose function is rhetorical persuasion whose successful construction is accomplished through the joint efforts of the speaker and audience, and this is its essential character

claim — fact, definition, value, policy

the conclusion whose merits we are seeking to establish

what the rhetor is trying to persuade the audience to believe

• Claim of fact: a claim that advances an empirically verifiable statement

• Claim of definition: a claim that identifies how a concept or term should be defined

• Claim of value: a claim that advances a statement about what is worthy

• Claim of policy: a claim that addresses what should be done

data

the information on which the claim is based

warrants

bridges, or the generalizable rules and principles that link data to claims

shows jump from data to conclusion is reasonable/warranted

conditions of rebuttal

circumstances in which the general authority of the warrant should be set aside

qualifier

a statement indicating the strength conferred by the warrant

backing

an assurance that the warrant is authoritative/current

ad hominem attacks

arguments against the person making the claim that are irrelevant to the claim

spheres of argument

branches of activity—the grounds upon which arguments are built and the authorities to which arguers appeal

grounds

the core assumptions about how the world is organized and the basic premises on which arguments are built

authorities

the sources of evidence that are accepted or the people who are allowed to speak as experts in that sphere

personal sphere argument

informal argument among a small number of people, involving limited demands for proof, and often about topics that matter only to those involved in the conversation

technical sphere argument

argument that has explicit rules and is judged by those with specific expertise in the subject

public sphere argument

argument that exists to handle disagreements transcending personal and technical disputes

stock issues

recurring argument themes necessary to justify assent: significance, inherency, solvency, and desirability

confirmation bias

the tendency for people to search for or interpret information in a manner that favors their current beliefs

disconfirmation bias

when people do not look for, favorably interpret, or recall evidence that is contrary to their beliefs

alternative facts

claims by political leaders that are false or made without any data

vertical reading

a person stays w/in a website to evaluate its reliability

lateral reading

leaving a site after a quick scan and opening up new browser tabs in order to judge the credibility of the original site

semiotics

the relationship among signs, meanings, and referents

recognizes a relationship between a sign and a referent

denotation

the literal, commonsense meaning of a sign, ostensibly value-free and objective

connotation

the emotional or cultural meaning attached to a sign

it is what is signified

theory of linguistic relativity

the idea that the structure of a language influences the way people perceive the world

dramatism

an idea that is premised on two interlocking assumptions — (1) language is primarily a species of action rather than an instrument of definition, and (2) the best way to understand human relations and motives is through an analysis of symbolic action

terministic screen

a screen composed of terms through which humans perceive the world, and that directs attention away from some interpretations and toward others

public vocabulary

the culturally established and sanctioned terms that compose people’s taken-for-granted understanding of the world

ideograph

represents an ordinary language term found in political discourse

high order abstraction representing collective commitment to a particular but equivocal and ill-defined normative goal

warrants the use of power, excuses behavior and belief into channels easily recognized by a community as acceptable or laudable

• Ex: freedom & security

characterization

the labels and descriptions rhetors attach to acts, agencies, agents, scenes, and purposes

• Act: what took place, in thought or deed

• Scene: the background of the act, the situation in which it occurred

• Agent: the person or kind of person who performed the act

• Agency: the means by which the act was accomplished

• Purpose: the justification for the act

metaphor

a figure of speech in which two dissimilar things are said to be similar, offering a new perspective on a known issue

discursive symbolism

language use w/ a linear structure that operates through reason and not intuition

presentational symbolism

a direct presentation of an individual object that widens our conception of rationality far beyond the traditional boundaries, yet never breaks faith w/ logic in the strictest sense

gestalt

a pattern or structure whose parts are so integrated that one cannot really describe the pattern simply by referring to the parts

condensation symbol

a name, word, phrase, or maxim which stirs vivid impressions involving the listener’s most basic values and readies the listener for action

god terms

expression[s] about which all other expressions are ranked as subordinate and that have the capacity to demand sacrifice

devil terms

terms of repulsion

resignification

a process in which people reject the connotation of a symbol, expose how the meaning of the symbol is constructed, and attempt to change its connotation (and maybe even its denotation)

doublespeak

language used in the real world to confuse or deliberately distort its actual meaning rather than to achieve understanding

• Makes the bad seem good

• Language that pretends to communicate but really doesn’t

• 2 types: euphemism & inflated language

euphemism

a word used to denote a thing in a way that avoids connotations of harshness or unpleasantness

inflated language

language designed to make the ordinary seem extraordinary

to make everyday things seem impressive

to give an air of important to people, situations, or things that would not normally be considered important

to make the simple seem complex

truncated passives

sentences that use a passive verb (to be form) in order to delete the agent of action

dramatism

Burke’s theory of rhetoric and the theories related to it; the study of how language and other symbol systems create the rhetorical world in which we lived

motion

nonsymbolic

action

based on symbols/rhetoric

identification

A is not identical w/ his colleague, B, but insofar as their interests are joined, A is identified w/ B or he may identify himself w/ B even when their interests are not joined, if he assumes that they are, or is persuaded to believe so

real or perceived overlap of two individuals’ perspectives or ways of seeing the world

pentad

a tool of analysis that lets us trace how our worlds are constructed through rhetoric

• Act: what happens/takes place

• Scene: context/background of the action

• Agent: person or persons who perform the act

• Agency: means through which the action takes place

• Purpose: reason an action took place

ratio

relationship between two pentadic terms

terms for order

humans tend to naturally seek order, given our drive for perfection & hierarchy

the stages through which tragic redemption occurs including guilt, purification, and redemption

mortification

guilty party admits guilt & asks for forgiveness

scapegoat

the representative or vessel of certain unwanted evils, the sacrificial animal upon whose back the burden of these evils is ritualistically loaded

narrative probability

asks whether the story is consistent w/ itself

one of the standards by which receivers evaluated narrative rhetoric (includes structural, material, and characterological coherence)

narrative fidelity

evaluates the degree to which the individual components of the story ring true w/ the audience

the standard used to evaluate the validity of the individual elements of narrative rhetoric

structural coherence

whether the story contradicts itself

material coherence

how well the story accounts for facts that are known to be true

chronological coherence

questions the reliability of the characters in the story

fidelity

the individual components of stories and the degree to which these components make sense to the audience

five concepts to understand fidelity

fact, relevance, consequence, consistency, and transcendent issue

• Question of fact: explored the values that are embedded in a story

• Question of relevance: concerns the appropriateness of the values to the nature of the decision

• Question of consequence: examines the effects of adhering to a particular value set when making a decision

• Question of consistency: asks if the values of the story confirm one’s personal experience

• Question of transcendent issue: asks if the values in question constitute the ideal basis for human conduct

fantasies

very real events that happen to people and groups

a shared experience between people; stories shared by groups of people

fantasy theme

contents of stories that are retold by group members

shared experiences or stories retold among a group of people

fantasy types

fantasies that have similar plot outlines, scenes, and characters and that are repeated patterns of exchange

common stories told over and over again

chaining out

the process by which fantasy themes or types are spread through a group or culture

rhetorical vision

the result of fantasy sharing, in which members of a culture, community, or group share a similar way of understanding reality

narrative (by Gerald Prince, professor)

the representation of at least two real or fictive events or situations in a time sequence, neither of which presupposes or entails the other

• Referential, meaning narrative depicts/describes events

personal memory

the manner in which individuals remember their own pasts

collective memory (by Maurice Halbwachs)

a shared and constructed creation of a group or nation

public memory

a particular type of collective memory that combines the memories of the dominant culture and fragments of the memories of marginalized groups, and that enables people to make sense of the past, present and future

myth (Martha Cooper, comm scholar)

a particular form of narrative that is a dramatic vision that serves to organize everyday experience and give meaning to life

• Teach cultural values as they structure how you think about yourself, other people, society, and the world around you

post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy

a fallacy that occurs when reasoning takes the form of after this therefore because of this

vivacity

a sense of immediacy or presence created through the use of descriptions, imagery, and colorful language that make an idea come alive

one way to create presence in verbal texts

plot

the chain of causation of events w/in a narrative

relates the meaning of the events in the narrative by laying out a story line a.k.a. the arc of the story

• Good plot captures attention by providing mechanism for understanding how narrator selected various events & connected them to each other

character development

the process of describing the actions of and relationships among actors w/in the story

• Characters should conform to behaviors audience expects

social truth

those beliefs and values that do not refer to some objective reality, but to social reality

those beliefs about what is right that people have arrived at together

• Social truth lies in meaning of story

narrative fidelity

asks whether the events included in the story correspond to the audience’s experiences and understanding of reality

narrative probability

asks the question what constitutes a coherent story or, more simply, does the story hang together

representative anecdote (by Kenneth Burke, theorist/critic)

a narrative that summarizes a person, thing, or situation

• Appropriate representative anecdote will contain the essence of the item being represented

comic frame

a viewpoint that would have you see others as mistaken rather than as evil

• Solution is to correct them

tragic frame

a viewpoint that would have you see others as vicious and evil rather than as mistaken

• Destruction is the only possible solution